Verification

Historical note: Healing Health Products relied on a detailed description of incoming-mail records, not a bare denial of receipt. It also held that neither party had been granted the CPLR 3212(g) findings they assumed. The carrier’s summary-judgment motion remained denied; the provider was not awarded judgment.

Last reviewed: September 2026.

A detailed incoming-mail account raised a factual dispute in Healing Health Products v New York Central Mutual Fire Insurance Co., decided May 22, 2014. The Appellate Term affirmed the denial of the insurer’s summary-judgment motion. The provider’s showing was more specific than a simple assertion that no verification letters arrived.

The insurer first supplied mailing evidence

The insurer offered proof of mailing three initial verification requests and three follow-up requests. That established its initial showing that the correspondence had been sent under the described office procedures.

The provider’s owner then explained how incoming mail was handled and recorded. The affidavit addressed the practice’s computer records and physical files and the review used to determine whether the disputed letters had been received. The court found that showing sufficient to raise a factual issue.

This is the distinction lost in describing the opposition as merely “pro-forma.” The owner’s position at the practice did not make any assertion sufficient. The court evaluated what the affidavit said about handling and reviewing the records.

Mailing completion does not eliminate the proof question

The opinion explains that written verification requests are complete upon proper mailing. It does not follow that the sender may dispense with evidence that proper mailing occurred.

A presumption arising from an established mailing practice can still face a sufficient factual challenge. The response must therefore be assessed against the actual mailing evidence, not an abstract rule that nonreceipt either always defeats a motion or never matters.

Triangle R illustrates the bare-denial side of that comparison. Healing Health Products describes a more detailed record. The cases are useful together because they identify different evidentiary showings, not because either creates a universal winning affidavit.

Carbon copies to counsel did not resolve the dispute

The carrier also relied on copies addressed to the provider’s attorney. The court did not treat those purported duplicates as eliminating the question concerning the provider’s receipt. It did not find the attorney obligated on this record to forward them in a way that cured the disputed mailing.

That is not a general rule that service on counsel is irrelevant. The decision concerns verification correspondence and the particular basis offered for imputing receipt. A letter seeking information from a provider, an EUO communication directed through retained counsel, and service of litigation papers can present different questions.

The related Recover Medical Services note explains the separate argument that an insurer had to send an additional delay letter to the provider’s attorney. That issue should not be used to substitute for proof of the requests at issue here.

Neither side had the limited-issue order it assumed

The opinion also corrected both parties’ understanding of the earlier ruling. Neither had obtained the favorable CPLR 3212(g) findings they assumed would narrow trial.

A denied summary-judgment motion does not automatically establish all undisputed facts a party hoped to rely on. Counsel needs the actual order and any findings specifying which issues no longer require proof. Without that, a trial plan may rest on a supposed concession the court never made.

Right Aid Medical Supply addresses a later trial where earlier findings really had settled the request-mailing issue. Its reversal on burden allocation makes more sense when compared with the absence of such a ruling here.

What remained unresolved

The insurer did not obtain dismissal, but the provider did not receive a judgment directing payment. A factual dispute remained. The decision did not determine that the insurer fabricated letters or that the provider’s account had to be accepted at trial.

For a similar file, the useful evidence includes the mailing procedure, the addressed requests, incoming-mail records, any computer and physical-file review, the copied correspondence and the exact prior order. Those documents show whether the file resembles the detailed evidence accepted here or the bare denial rejected in Triangle R.

Jason’s original commentary

The original comments below are retained as historical commentary. The case-specific corrections and later developments are explained above.

In this case, a pro-forma non-receipt affidavit – similar to the one I suspect in E4 Servs., Inc. v Lincoln Gen. Ins. Co. 43 Misc.3d 136(A)(App. Term 1st Dept. 2014) – was sufficient to raise an issue of fact as to whether the verification was mailed.  The Court opined on the significance of mailing the verification to the “attorney”

A statement of non-receipt brings forth a triable issue of fact.  As to the “attorney argument”, the Court cites to NY Hosp., which states there should be communication between the provider and the attorney and to Great Wall where the Court went to great pains to state that counsel explicitly stated that (s)he represented EIP for purposes pf an EUO.  I do not necessarily see the distinction here; I also question why the rule in marte-rosario which states that service of a letter on an attorney is sufficient to to impute knowledge to the EIP is not followed here.  This panel makes up rules as it goes along.

Connect to the Encyclopedia

Start with the no-fault verification hub and 2026 Chapa update for the governing framework and case directory. Related case notes:

• Radiology Today: the requested MRI films were missing.
• Mount Sinai v Dust Transit: the NF-5 and the missing follow-up.
• Right Aid: reversal over the verification-trial burden.
• Recover Medical Services: attorney notice and late EUO requests.
• The recalled AIG opinion and its November replacement.
• Triangle R: provider requests and misaddressed assignor copies.
• SS Medical Care: letter copies and an unopposed cross-motion.

For review of a particular no-fault verification dispute, request a Free Case Review. Keep the requests, responses and relevant claim dates available for that review.